Clothesline for Birdie
Montana really loves hanging her clothes to dry outside. She set up a makeshift line between the corner of the deck and an old dead tree in her backyard, and she makes the most of it. I love the country-ness of it all.
I came upon an Amish business that sells a really nice aluminum pulley system for clotheslines, so we decided to upgrade Montana’s setup to give her a 60’ double-line stretch that will (hopefully) stand up to the elements.
First we needed to dig two three-foot deep holes, which around here, in Rockland USA, sounds a lot easier than it actually can be sometimes. You never know how much rock you are going to hit until you choose a spot and start. In this case, one hole was a breeze and the other was a nightmare, hitting rock at about 6” and requiring a lot of chipping and breaking up of rock. We happily settled for 2.5 feet.
Tool of the trade: “Tazz”, our gas-powered auger (Tazz is the brand name, not a Loonie Tunes reference.)
Other tools of the trade: The manual post hole digger, which, by the way, would absolutely not be able to cut through the rock-hard dirt we have around here. But we use it to grab dirt displaced by Tazz. The shovel is really just to push away some of the augered dirt so it doesn’t fall back down the hole while we are digging. The black tool isn’t photographed very well - it is a heavy-duty tamper. This long piece of metal is super heavy, weighs a ton. One end has a flat, sharp edge which can really get into those tight spaces; the other end is round to flatten down small spots.
Steve just getting started, before he hit pure rock.
Josie grabbing some shade in Steve’s shadow.
This device is incredibly helpful - we literally could not dig in this dirt without it - but it is also incredibly dangerous when you hit rock. The auger stops and the machine can just swing out of control if it is full-throttle. Steve has messed up his wrists more than a few times in those moments and has learned to take it a little slow when rocks are involved.
Happiness.
The manual post hole digger: push the levers together which opens the blades, pull them apart and lift to grab some dirt.
Then we place our 4x6x10 posts, keeping them level both directions, and set them in concrete for the night.
This little device is critical for setting square fence posts. Without it you would need two levels on each side to keep things square. However I still question the project manager who gave this job to the blind lady.
Concrete away! One bag per post.
Tamp, tamp, tamp.
Just add water!
Cement soup.
See you tomorrow!
